When the rising moon reached its apex over the Regalian capital, the sleeping hearts of its myriad Estelley worshipers stirred with a certain thunder like so much icy kindling needling at their chests. Collapsing if they were awake, and ripped into a vivid dream if they were not, any faithful who believed in the Estelley religion would receive the following vision, of a place - for them - very, very far away. Their eyes clouded with the blurry skies of Daen, as their minds were taken to the desolate wasteland recently created, and they saw through the eyes of a single white-feathered owl which circled high above but witnessed and heard all in excruciating detail. The air smoldered gray with still-blowing smoke from hundreds of thousands of destroyed buildings and the fire which raged across the forests of the foothills, above the rent, pitted marble walls of a once-glorious city, the Elven citadel of Meyranlëy. The first oddity was visible even then: a flickering moonlight dome held up over the still-standing spires, barely able to maintain itself, but present all the same. The owl circled, only for the viewer to perceive through its eyes the barest signs of life in the parts of the city not reduced to rubble: mostly disoriented, staggering groups of Elves wheeling barrels of supplies around or repairing pieces of brickwork, in places assisted by Maquixtl or chained Asha. A blue flame crept from the nearby mount, down the river. Lapping, rushing through the water as a wave borne on its curls, it flew towards the city’s white marble sluice gate protected by decapitated guardian statues of Leyon, his palm still held up forbidding the intruder to pass. Yet the weak wards gave way for the immense psychic presence slamming into them, building into a torrent with each passing moment. It sang as it slammed against dilapidated once-gilded brickwork, it chanted as it swirled over rocks and rubble, spreading out. More and more fluttered from the mountain as the Elves visible within the city began to panic, trying to get to higher ground to wash the flame off of them, but failing. A cold light that did not burn, it clung to their robes like oil, flickering away in the air. The owl circled closer. It soared past the defiantly standing clocktower, blinking through the moonlight shield with a soft hoot, perching on an ornamented edge decorated with long-forgotten lapis runes. Peering down, soaring from standing placed to standing place to follow the movement of the vivid blue fire that sparkled and sang with light, it perched on the shoulder of the only one not touched by it: a starved-looking novice nun of Leyon, hair blotted an ashy white, kneeling on the ground amidst what had once been the town center, stone tiling wide and open enough to hold a crowd of a hundred thousand. She stared up with unseeing eyes, hands gestured to the heavens in supplication, unable to see past the outline of the desperate spell she had worked by divine intervention to save her own life and those of all others within those walls. A large hand appeared on her shoulder. With the deafening toll of a bell, all erupted at once: seeing in all directions at once, the owl witnessed a few Elves writhing in agony as the fire consumed them into fine azure ash which drifted off on the wind, while hands of the newly living punched out of the rubble and crawled to safety, some Elves, some Maquixtl, some Asha and Eronidas and others, crawling like men possessed towards the still-kneeling nun and the hand that sat atop her, unable to see the one whose body it belonged to. Most simply stood and marveled, gasping, looking at their palms. The square filled and filled, the people lining up and settling down, some standing and some kneeling, others twisted so that all could lay eyes on the priestess, their irises haunted with the moonlight that fluttered in their stares. It was only then that the form of the Justice Arken, or at least what could usually be recognized as the Justice Arken, became visible. A piece of the flooding flame had stuck up into the crest of a wave, extending a pole of light forward from its side, from which she hung like a stringless marionette, its outline punching a hole through her armor in the back to connect to her body. She seemed in terrible condition, so much silver blood dripping as ichor to the ground in soft rhythm, her hand weakly curled, fingers pale, around the priestess’ shoulder. The young woman awoke with a start and rushed to her feet, turning around to witness the being before her, visibly shuddering and shaking in fear - only to be asked a simple question. “What can yet be done?” At first, she assumed it to be for her, her mouth opening slightly. Interrupted by the moaning wails which screamed from the still-possessed crowd, clasping their hands and sobbing, shouting with such emotion that the Magic from their bodies set the air aflame with sparkling light. Each one begged Justice to intercede for this relative or that relative, to save one who had been lost in an instant or to restore the houses that could never be rebuilt, to take revenge on their behalf against the ones who had hurt them. With each word, the Arken’s body seemed to shudder and shake more at the sense of pure helplessness, neck jerking from side to side, terrible wounds further deepening. It was only the priestess who did not beg a favor, shocked enough only to stare, clasping her staff with two hands and recoiling in anxious worry. Looking on the mortal she grasped, attempting to understand as best could an Arken’s mind the sacrifice of one who lived, truly lived in the sense as men do, Justice’s eyes brightened and brightened, leaking fire into the air so bright that spidery cracks crawled out from the mask of her face, body sundering beyond the point of no return. A question that the deity had asked herself a very long time ago and yet never found an answer to reverberated somewhere in her mind like so many bells tolling, the raw psychic emanations strong enough that those witnessing the vision would begin to toss and turn, seizing up where they lay. At last, she understood. The vision became pale and blinding white, the dancing azure inferno from all across the city rushing to soar back into her body through the hole in her back, the sky itself shuddering as the heavens breached with a new presence. Silver wounds sealed shut and hissed thin trails of smoke into the air, the Arken’s stare turning up towards the constellations, her legs too giving, and causing her to fall to a knee. “For the living who remain.” Almost as an answer to the proposed question earlier, unfinished, but to her, all too complete. The worst was over. The air glimmered with a soft radiance, gentle and comforting. It was silent for a minute that felt like an eternity, the entire crowd kneeling, Justice kneeling, and only the priestess standing with the owl on her shoulder and a sea of the grieving mingled with the dead around her, Elves and Eronidas and Asha and others alike, captured in sight of some cosmic truth. Justice arose and lifted a hand. Chains and thralling spells, the ardent gift of Cemaan, fell from the gathered slaves and clattered to the ground, spluttering as pools of molten metal. She hissed as she found at last within the power to break the might of a God, eyes widening with the realization, pensive expression visible through the owl’s own close view. “I set you free,” she boomed in the voice of a thousand that carried through the air and echoed across the moonlight dome, “But you must tell your Gods,” commanded the Arken now turned something greater, body now whole and healed, the damage to even her armor mended with a shimmer, though the brightness still hissed from her stare. She hesitated. “But you must tell your Gods,” she repeated somberly with a finger pointed towards the sky, “that a life is a life, and Justice can never forgive.” The priestess finally fell to a knee. Justice did not speak to the Elves, there, then, who still stared in wonderment: she merely fixed them with an imperious look and began to rise into the sky, curls of brilliant Exist Magic swirling around her body. She remained there for a minute more, silhouetted against the many spires which still crumbled from the battering they had taken, the occasional pebble sliding from the side of a chipped building and falling into the nearby lake. It was almost peaceful, the way she floated there, if one disregarded the context. Every Elf understood the painful legacy of the Allorn nation, whether for or against it, and everything the Elves had done in the name of victory. A profound understanding floated through the chests of all who stared. Be things as they may, a life is a life, and a sin is a sin, and judgment must be given. The agony of one does not justify the agony of another, and so a standard of perfection in the world is to realize true impartiality; to look on the ways of others and know right from wrong without the fog of attachment clouding one’s eyes, to be merciful when mercy is asked for and cruel when cruelty is required, to be fair to one’s fellow man and not covet without reason, to uplift without envy. Justice is not only to gore a wretched sinner on the pointed edge of a sword; it is also to bring spare harvest to one struck by famine, to raise homes destroyed by fire or remake goods stolen by pirates. Justice is to, in the most fundamental sense, make it right for others even when it is inconvenient for the self. Bells tolled. The ashen sky far above now glimmered white with rays piercing through it as Justice arose, the protective dome dispelling, but the night sky visible for the first time since that tragic night what seemed like an age ago. She called out: “We shall do as we should. Even if we cannot.” With this, the vision abruptly ended, sending all who had seen it shuddering awake. From the grief of the damned millions, the Arken of Justice has answered the question that has sent each of her incarnations to its death, and broken the cycle with the wisdom found only in the pits of incomprehensible tragedy. https://wiki.massivecraft.com/Estelley has been updated to reflect her divine nature as Artarel the Judgment God, and the new Estelley Religion Mechanic kindled in the hearts of all who witnessed her ascension.
